The partnership between San Jose State University and the city on the new Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Library symbolizes a dramatic shift from a relationship that in recent decades was one of indifference and sometimes disdain.

James Walsh, a retired history professor, calls the new joint library at San Jose State a symbol of ``the reconciliation of the city and university.''

The estrangement of the two institutions is a story of the social forces that forever changed the city and the university. Where their relationship is headed is a story of the city's quest to create a vibrant downtown and the 146-year-old campus' search for identity.

The $177.5 million library, which opened Aug. 1 and will hold its grand opening Saturday, was proposed six years ago by former mayor Susan Hammer and ex-San Jose State president Robert Caret. Its opening comes at a critical time, as the university searches for a replacement for Caret, who left this summer, and the city pushes downtown development east with a $343 million civic center a block from the library.

Changing relationships

For much of their modern history, the city and university have been mired in their own problems, neither seeing their fortunes as intertwined. The city, struggling with urban decay downtown and record suburban growth, regarded the university as peripheral at best. The university, coping internally with cultural change, became an island.

In the early years, the city and university got along harmoniously, said Walsh, author of a new interpretive history of San Jose State University from 1950 to 2000.

Then came the tumult of the Vietnam War era. Swept up in campus anti-war and anti-racism protests of the 1960s, San Jose State strained to keep up with an expanding student population and battened down against the crime and blight downtown.

The city and university drifted into an arms-length relationship as California emptied its mental institutions and the fraternity and sorority system collapsed under the wave student activism. Boarding and halfway houses took over many of the big houses downtown as students began commuting from farther away.

``The university felt besieged by the criminal element of community and fewer faculty wanted to live downtown because the public schools were going downhill,'' Walsh said.

By the end of the 1970s, there was little reason for students and faculty to spend much time off campus.

``The city and university had one great thing in common -- they were both overwhelmed by the same trends and they wouldn't or couldn't make the changes necessary to change that atmosphere,'' said former San Jose mayor Tom McEnery, who championed the effort to turn downtown around.

San Jose State took shelter behind a line of tall, inward-facing buildings dubbed ``the Great Wall'' of Fourth Street.

``The university turned its back on downtown because there wasn't a lot to open your arms to,'' said Scott Knies, a 1979 graduate who now heads the San Jose Downtown Association.

In those days, city streets cut through the university, carving the campus into a checkerboard. Though the university had convinced the city to close two streets through campus in the '60s and '70s, residents revolted when, in the early '90s, university president Gail Fullerton asked to close San Carlos Street -- the last street bisecting the campus.

Residents worried that the closing would divert traffic onto neighborhood streets and city officials balked at the idea. But then-city redevelopment chief Frank Taylor saw it as a way to create a pedestrian gateway into the campus, and San Carlos was closed through the campus in 1994.

To many, it marked a turning point for both institutions.

University's role

Downtown revitalization was making headway and Hammer found a kindred spirit in Caret, who took over as university president in 1994. San Jose State, Caret said, was a ``metropolitan university.'' It had an obligation to use its resources and develop partnerships to benefit the university and the community.

Until then, Hammer said, ``I don't think anyone at the helm really understood the role of an urban university that is right in the middle of a city. No one understood what an important institution the university was downtown, and that it needed to be a player.''

The metropolitan university philosophy is embodied in the new library. And the librarians who run it hope other partnerships will emerge.

Patricia Breivik, dean of the university library, already has reached out to area history organizations to work with the library on preserving local historical photographs and papers. City library Director Jane Light speaks of enlisting university students to help with family literacy programs operating out of the library.

The success of the partnership ``sends a really clear signal to employees in both organizations to be more creative and think outside the box,'' San Jose Mayor Ron Gonzales said.

Common interests

Now the city and university have began a joint master-planning process to discuss such common interests as zoning around the university, economic and housing development, traffic and parking, and sports facility needs.

``Our goals aren't that different and we are already connected together,'' downtown Councilwoman Cindy Chavez said. ``We need each other to be successful to continue to have a thriving San Jose.''

A lively downtown helps the university recruit the students, faculty and staff, said Don Kassing, vice president for administration. ``All that downtown activity creates a presence and a sense of who we are.''

Far from an island, the university is now a bona fide part of the downtown, said Knies, the downtown association chief. ``This sense of community isn't just a theory,'' he said, ``it's starting to become part of our fabric.''

The flow of energy should intensify when the university completes a $250 million ``housing village'' for 6,000 students and more than 200 faculty members on campus. Construction began this year.

San Jose State has tried to build bridges with its residential neighbors. While some say things have improved, the university has not won over everyone.

Although she said she loves the new library, April Halberstadt, a longtime Naglee Park resident, said she still views the university with suspicion.

The administration has come up with ``one wild, inappropriate idea after another,'' Halberstadt said. She pointed to university plans several years ago for a major mixed-use campus development, including a hotel, as a way to build new academic buildings. San Jose State put the plans on hold when the economy soured.

Others say the university is more open than in the past.

Campus police have played a critical role in helping neighborhoods battle crime, said Lisa Jensen, president of the University Neighborhoods Coalition. And the university has helped neighborhoods develop revitalization plans after obtaining federal grants.

``We have ongoing differences of opinion on how to address issues,'' Jensen said, ``but university management takes our problems seriously."